


In Death Should We Be

by Dreamsoda



Category: Keturah and Lord Death - Martine Leavitt, Original Work
Genre: Cecil and levi's ship name is, Death and the Maiden, F/M, cevy to the levy, or cevy for short, original work but an au lol, slowburn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-16
Updated: 2018-02-16
Packaged: 2019-03-19 08:04:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13700325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dreamsoda/pseuds/Dreamsoda
Summary: She thinks her life ought to end. Death has other ideas for her.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Destroyed the old version, this is the updated re-written work lol. I'll be updating like....once every two and half years. As of right now it's my main focus, but I'm busy, I got school, and I hate myself so :P  
> Thanks for reading!!
> 
> If you wanna see art of Cecil and Levi my art blog is year-838.tumblr.com. There's not a lot of levi but he's around. Add /tagged/levi if you want to find him.

The dismal light looming from the overcast morning and limbs of winter trees hung dismally in the clearing. Despite the drifts of snow sparkling in the sparse light, the world, began to slowly drain of all color. A hard smoke misted into the forest, blocking any light from drifting from elsewhere and obscuring a shadowy rider passing through.

He’d always loved the woods this time year. The snow, the frost, his breath smoking in front of him. When he was alive he’d always enjoyed a walk through the woods while the ends of a snowstorm fluttered around him. The quiet of winter had always delighted him. The way the world seemed to slow, the trees leafing with ice, how the sky looked, despite the cold, he’d never grown tired of it.  
He was taking his time now, as he always did, and he was especially grateful the young woman who was dying had given him the chance to trot through the woods of his youth once more. He longed for the ambition to take low rides such as these through the woods, but being in the realm of the living was too depressing anymore. He allowed himself the pleasure of the woods, but realized this would be the last for a long while.

His horse pushed through the bare branches of brush and tress, stepping into the relatively small clearing that was his destination. It was mostly insignificant. Snow slopped along the tree edges and bushes spotted around the edges. Someone could have easily walked by without noticing the half-dead body of the woman. Her skin was a deathly white and her dress, a yellowed linen night gown, blended easily into the snow. Had it not been for her ebony hair, she would have easily melted into the forest.

Only someone who was looking for her could have separated her from meaningless backdrop and human. And to his chagrin, he had been sent to find her.

The young woman collapsed against the base of a tree was almost completely comatose. She was too weak to move, too far gone to notice his approach. If she could, she would have used whatever strength she’d stored for this moment to be thrilled. She’d been waiting in the snow long enough that flurries had buried her feet, hands, and body, the cause of her camouflage.

He’d taken longer than she’d expected. She had sat down days before in the middle of the storm that had covered the village and forest with snow, expecting him to come for her that night when her body froze. She’d been confident that he’d come quickly. She hadn’t even gone that deep into the forest, barely 50 paces away from her house. Yet? There she sat, buried and dying three days later.  
That first night when he hadn’t come for her she could have made the journey back and sat in front of her father’s fire with no mention of the night she’d secretly spent in the snow. But her own stubbornness and blind determination kept her buried. Whether it be from frost or hunger or thirst or boredom, he would come.

At the end of the third night, her body too stiff to move, he came.

He rode on his black horse, carrying the darkness with him.

He stopped a good deal away, regarding the young woman slumped against the tree. He had thought he’d been remarkably early, despite his tendency to dawdle, yet she was a lifeless corpse already half buried. He enjoyed the conversation before he carried away his passengers, yet he couldn’t tell if she was alive or dead. He dropped from the saddle into the snow, leaving no footprints, and approached, all the while regarding her and the strange predicament she had found buried herself in.

If his intuition was correct, she appeared to be dying of thirst. He couldn’t really believe that with all the snow around, and just a stone’s throw from the village to beg for a little hot water. He also realized that she was, if she’d been given drink, on her way to dying of starvation, yet there she was not out of arm’s reach from a berry bush heavy with delicious, decadent berries.  
It was hardly in his nature to take things he was _obligated_ to take, the idea of him taking things which were offered was laughable. And this reeked of a willful offering.

He leaned on a knee before her and tipped her face up, his cold gloved fingers doing no more damage than the wind and snow before him. She felt his hands on her face, but her eyes only barely fluttered. The energy to even open her eyes completely gone.

“Cecil,” He asked, tipping her chin more towards him, “Are you trying to kill yourself?”

He decided he would give her a bit of energy, but she stubbornly refused to answer him. She was annoyed he had come to berate her instead of doing what she’d kindly asked him to do.

Instead of answering the question he expected, she replied, “You’re late,” and turned her face off his hand, looking down at herself, buried in snow, “You were supposed to come…days ago.” She was startled to see her body, but not feel it. Had the rest of her body died? She attempted to wiggle her fingers, but there didn’t seem to be any fingers to wiggle. Nevertheless, it was the best she’d felt in years, being half-dead and all.

“I would have come if I was called,” he replied, admittedly amused by her sass, “If you have been sitting out here trying to get me to come, I wasn’t informed.”

She stiffly snapped her head to him, he seemed unperturbed by her glare, but she was taken off guard at actually staring Death in the face. Her mouth hung open, her retort lost as she stared at his severe face. Even with the slight smile tugging at his expression, he looked grim. A white scar edged up from his neck and neck and across his cheek. His skin was ashen and pale, making his black hair seem harsh. But weirdest of all, he had both a dark blue and dark brown eye.

She shook her head slightly, refocusing, “You just—you—you were ignoring me! I’ve been asking you come for _years_.”

He almost smiled, so close to death and still so spunky. It reminded him of something very, very old and long gone now. He leaned off his knee and stood, “You’re too young, Cecil, you have years yet to live. You’re not ready to die. I should have expected you to try something like this, though,” he regarded her carefully. There’d been instances previously, but nothing as serious as this. She’d never required a visit. He’d been called, yes, and just in time to keep her from her silly plans, but she was actually dying this time.

He shouldn’t have been surprised to find her trying something more obvious and drastic than pills, but he also believed those who romanticized death only liked to live close to the edge, not leap over it. Of course, the duty of making sure she stopped trying constantly didn’t fall to him. Keeping her alive was the exact opposite of his job. He shook his head. He couldn’t do anything to make her father keep a closer eye on her, it seemed.

“Give those years to someone else, I don’t want them.”

“They are your years, Cecil, who would take them?”

“I don’t know, infants? Look at me, Lord Death, you can’t take me back now—I’ve been out here for days. I should be dead. You’d be cheating yourself if you force me to live.”

Since he had up stood away from her, the feeling in her arms and legs had started to worm it’s way back in, inexplicably. She could feel his mythical aura working through her, bringing her back from the brink. She blamed him for giving her the energy to talk with that touch on her face. It wasn’t exactly his fault limps waking up from death was incredibly painful, but she wanted to blame him for the pain nonetheless.

“Then consider myself cheated,” he said, looking down at her, “Your father misses you. He’s not ready to lose you and you are not yet ready to die. Get up and I’ll escort you home and make sure you make it back alive.” Despite the passing smirk at his joke, he watched her passively, unnaturally still, waiting for her to get up with the energy he’d given her. He wouldn’t be surprised if he had to carry her to her house, despite her revival. It was just a stone’s throw away, close enough that he didn’t think the effort to mount his horse with her was worth it, but she was still an ill little girl.

“I’m not getting up, unless you force me,” she said defiantly, crossing her arms with the energy he’d given her. Of course she’d waste energy on something as stubbornly pointless as that.

“You’re too young.”

“Are you claiming you’ve never killed children?”

“Children don’t tend attempt to kill themselves. I don’t reward suicide.” He did find it amusing she thought she could out stubborn death, “Come now, get up.”

“I am not getting up,” she bit at him, watching him with ferocity, “You say all I have to do is ask and here you are denying me! I have been asking you come for years and years—you’re right here! Take me!”

He regarded her with an air of amusement, but kept his expression stony. He knew she was in pain, but it wasn’t pain that would kill her. There were days she was more mobile than her crutch dependent father. Of course, there were days that she was in bed crippled with pain. Despite her mess of a body, which was undoubtedly trying to kill itself, he estimated she could fight on her own for another five years. Nevertheless, he understood her desire to die. That didn’t mean he was going to kill her. She couldn’t even say the words.

“I’m not going to take you, Cecil.”

She smacked the snow next to her weakly, the strength already wearing thin due to her reckless waste, “If I had gotten lost and you’d found me buried in snow we would be halfway to the afterlife, it’s no different. Y-you don’t _really_ know if this is an attempt or not.”

“Oh, I know, Cecil,” his expression threatened to smile, “And I’m telling you I will carry you back in my own arms if you continue to idle here. Your father is distraught at your absence.”

“I’m telling you that I’m staying here!” She bit haughtily, pushing stiffly more into the tree. Just as she did so a heavy puff of snow collapsed on top of her, burying her further into the cold. The act alone made her go still and limp. As if the fluffy snow had somehow snapped her neck, just like that. The old man finally broke and smiled at the girl’s attempt to trick a Lord of Death into believing she’d died when he could feel every breath she took.

He waited to see how long she would keep up the façade and after minutes had passed he was impressed with the patience she was exhibiting. Had her father seen her sit still for five minutes he would have fainted. Levi let another five minutes pass before he crouched next to her again, brushing snow from her shoulder and face. He lightly thupped his forefinger under her chin and lifted her face.  
She didn’t want him touching her, out of pure spite against him, but she didn’t even flutter her eyes.

He couldn’t help but be delighted to no end at this charade. He tipped her face towards him more, brushing her jaw lightly with his thumb, “You’re delightful, Cecil,” he murmured, “If you simply stopped trying to kill yourself you’d be so full of life.”

She didn’t seem to respond, although he could feel her moving in a way that most of whom he dealt with no longer did, soft breath, a pulse on her lips. He almost saw her eyes roll, too.

Upon touching her again, he was surprised to find that despite the three days in the snow, almost completely buried now, she was still warm. Levi briefly let go of her face to fetch her hand from out of the drift. Her fingers were ungloved, yet they were softly pink with life. He hadn’t done that. He’d expected casualties to her body from this. Missing toes, missing fingers, burned skin, but this…  
He pressed her hands between his and, even through his gloves, he could feel the steady warmth radiating from her. He ungloved his hand, to test the warmth against his skin, and found in her hands a warmth he had forgotten. He hadn’t gone within touching distance of something with a pulse in…eons, it felt like. Even if the person had their pulse about them, their skin had lost all warmth long before he even mounted his horse.

Tracing her fingers, looking for any sign of gangrene at all, he glanced back up at her face, “Cecil, did you lied to me?”

She didn’t immediately respond, still playing her game of death.

He, unlike her insistence on this charade, didn’t have much patience and, upon un-gloving his other hand with selfish intentions, he lifted her chin again, cradling her face in his hand, “You lied to me.”  
“I did not,” she mumbled, exhibiting real exhaustion in her voice. The snow falling on her must have been a final straw for her. It was true he was here specifically because she was dying of thirst and hunger, all energy was quickly lost. There wasn’t much he could do about that.

“You claimed to have been out here for days, but you’re still warm,” he brushed her face lightly with a finger, “That constitutes lying.”

“I have—I’ve been out here for d-days, maybe…four?” Her voice grew uncertain, but he still didn’t believe her. There was no way she could lie to his intuition…but there was a chance he was reading into something that wasn’t entirely there. Something like this had never happened before, but there were firsts for everything, even after years and years of service. Still. Humans, even those who survived in drifts of snow, didn’t stay warm, hot even, after even one night.

“Nonsense—I’m done playing with you, Cecil,” he tapped her chin and squeezed her hand, standing up and pulling her hand with him.

He’d expected her to fall limply up into him, but, stubbornly, she’d used every last bit of everything to pull on him as much as he was pulling on her. Determinedly holding onto the snow and the tree, staring up at him, tiredly, but steadfast, “ _I—am—not going—_! Until you t-take me, I am staying here—and if you won’t I’ll wait until another reaper _will_!” Her voice cracked pathetically, her eyes filling with tears, the last bit of determination swelling up inside her until she threatened to pop.

Levi stared at her face twisted with pain and anguish, “Don’t you want to see your father? You’re wanted, Cecil. Go home, I’ll come for you soon—” He started his usual speech, the one that worked for people like Cecil, the ones who _were_ loved, who _were_ wanted. But she wasn’t interested.

“Whenn??” She begged, pulling on his hand again, “I’m making everyone miserable— _I’m_ miserable—take me right now and they’ll never have to think about me again and _I’ll_ be happy."

“I’ll come for you when I do,” he said, almost perturbed by her begging.

“You’ve already came,” she pulled on his hand, “Take me now.”

He regarded her carefully. He didn’t like the corner she wanted to paint him into, “What’s so bad about living, Cecil? You have more good days than bad, a village of people who respect you, a father, a friend. Aside from your illnesses, what is it that you think you’ll get from dying?”

“I’m in pain—”

“No,” he interrupted, “I know you’re in pain, but it’s livable, you don’t give up life for pain, what’s bothering you?”

She was painfully quiet for a moment, watching him, begging him silently to just take her, please, just take her. He watched her with an even face, no longer smiling, but not showing concern or sympathy, either. He was simply watching her think up lies to avoid the truth.

“I make everyone miserable, they know I’m suffering and no one can do anything about it.”

“Their “misery” is less than what would be if you died.”

“That misery would be temporary. I’m holding everyone back. Their lives with me are pitiful—and revolve around me in the worst way. I want to let them go.”

He knew it wasn’t the truth, she knew it, too. But an idea of words had wormed into his mind, he’d seen a little glance of what really scared her and he thought to tease her.

“I don’t believe you,” he started, pulling on her hand with his full strength, lifting her to her feet easily. Snow falling off her as she fell into him, weak at the knees.

She gripped at his cape and he moved an arm around her to keep her from fainting in his arms. He could feel her warmth even through his layers and it momentarily distracted him. Thoughts of getting at the warmth and holding it against him invaded his mind and he gently fingered at her nightgown shamelessly, hoping for any break in the fabric to get at something warmer.

Stretched together like a corpse waltz and holding each other, Levi steadied her against him. She was a tall woman, lithe in frame, but weak from illnesses. She would have been his height if her knees could hold any weight. Instead, she was half at his chest, gazing up at him with pale, painful eyes, “Take me,” she mumbled, almost breathless from the mere exertion of standing.

“I think I will,” he mumbled back, letting go of her hand to frame her face, his thumb indulgently resting on her sorry, splintered lips, “Marry me.”

“What??” Her eyes suddenly popped from half lidded to wide open, “What—I’m too—N-No—”

He grinned, “I’ll marry you and take you with me to where I live, come with me.”

“I don’t want to get married—!” She spluttered, gripping his shirts tightly, “I—That wouldn’t fix anything, either—I want to _die_.”

He tutted softly, caressing her face and warm skin, “I want you warm. Bodies go cold when they die. Regardless, I could do something about your burdens.”

“I don’t want you at all,” she snapped, her determination seeking back in. He suddenly loved it. He was certain she’d reject anything he suggested like a petulant child. It remained endearing regardless.  
“How about this,” he leaned in closer, teasing himself more than her. He knew better than she that something as innocent as a kiss could, and would, kill her. It was only teasing, but her reaction, eyes widening and shoulders tightening, was treat enough, “Convince me that you need to die to make your lovers happy and I’ll kill you, or…marry me right now.”

“How can I convince you?” She asked desperately, “Anything—”

“I’ll give you a week, how’s that? In one week’s time come meet me here and either marry me or die.”

Fury burned in her eyes and she beat weakly on his chest, “You’re a cheat! You know I’m ready and you’re playing games with me!”

“You don’t have to play, Cecil,” he murmured, leaning his face closer, close enough he could feel her _hot_ breath on his face. _You can’t kiss her, you know that_. “Marry me now and live with me, or refuse and wait for me to come when it’s time.”

She froze in his arms, making it painfully obvious she’d never even remotely been given the chance to kiss someone in her life. He wasn’t going to give her the chance, but he wasn’t going to deny himself the pleasure of her life.

“Well?”

“Fine—I’ll play your game,” she bit at him, pulling on his clothes more, “And you can bet I’ll be dead in a week, and not married to _you_.”

He let a little grin form on his face, “We’ll see.” And in one motion he gathered her in his arms and made off with her back towards the village and her father.


	2. Chapter 2

He left her folded into the porch door long after dawn had passed. She was barely there, half dead, for a minute before a man coming up the road from town dropped his packages, stunned to find the body dumped on the porch. His scream startled Cecil and she slumped and jerked his way. Realizing she was alive, he hefted her up and burst through the door, holding Cecil like a bewildering, yet terrifying prize. The people already in the house clamored to the noise—each attracting another cluster, until Cecil and her rescuer were completely engulfed in mourners.

More and more people crowded around her, unbelieving it was really her, magically appearing on the porch after days, starved and dehydrated, but there she was! Her father crutched into the middle of the crowd, and perhaps for the first time in her life, threw himself on her, hugging and crying.

The whole morning was a wild blur for Cecil, people fed her and gave her drink and lots of questions were asked. Before the afternoon rolled around, though, every last person who had be doting on her with love and care, save for her father and their maid, had left. Disappointed the funeral they had been planning had been thwarted by her reappearance.

The afternoon went even quicker once the people disappeared. Someone carried her to her father’s bed and she slept tirelessly. Blurs of real life and dreams filtered past her and she didn’t wake until the next morning.

When she did wake, curled into blankets, she wondered if she were really alive. But the answer had to be yes. For the first time since she’d dropped out of her window that stormy night an eternity ago, she was completely lucid of both her mind and body. It was a weird feeling…a good feeling. Stranger, still, was the apparent presence of her father’s scent all around her. It was a smell she knew intimately, but getting close enough to the recluse was difficult, if not impossible. She felt weird wrapping up in his blankets and thinking about how much she loved him, how much she wished he would hold her more, how selfish she wanted to be for attention. Sitting outside had burned her nose, but there she was wrapped up in the pure smell of someone and something like it had never happened.

Cecil didn’t know if that was good or bad. Did she really want to let it go? He was the catalyst, yet if she could wrap herself in this cocoon of him forever, she would consider never begrudging him another day.

She must have laid like that for hours, curled up between sleep and awake and her father. She only stirred when she heard the door softly nudge open and the old familiar noise of his padded crutches creaking across the wooden floors.

As quick as her body would let her, she jerked mildly upright and, for a brief moment, they stared at each other. His glasses were smudged, his white hair matted to his head, and his shoulders seemed especially drooped.

Before she could react he nearly threw himself across the room to hug her, knocking the air out of her and her flat into the bed like a piece of paper. He awkwardly helped her to sit up, but never let go of her. She was nearly a foot taller than him and she had to hunch to hug him, but he held onto her for and held onto her and…held…onto…her…Crunching her frail body into his in a bear hug she didn’t think was possible to hide in his miniscule frame.

When he finally let go he held her at arms’ length with tears still in his eyes, “What happened?!”

“Lost in the woods,” she lied softly.

“How did you make it back to the door?”

“It is beyond me, daddy, I’m not even sure how I’m in this room.”

He laughed a wet laugh, beside himself with glee, mumbling in Italian about his baby, his little girl, alive.

She smiled at him with everything she could, but it was hollow.

“When did you even get out?” He gripped her hands almost painfully tight, “It must have been that medicine…it makes you loopy…”

She nodded, “Yeah.”

“Or the new sleep medication…you could have been sleep walking…” Her nightgown wasn’t lost on him. He took a sleeve in his hand, contemplating it. Cecil went quiet, watching him analyze the reality of being lost for however many days, in the woods, in the snow, in only the nightgown, “This kept you alive…”

Her toes curled under the blanket. Who would believe her that she’d walked out the door, barefoot, in a nightgown, and lived out in the woods for a few days? Even her very understanding and imaginative father wouldn’t buy it.

“We ought to get you a new one,” he said, carefully sitting himself on the bed, moving each of his legs with his hands into a better position to support himself.

She managed a weak shrug, “I guess. There doesn’t seem anything wrong with it.”

He went quiet, back to analyzing the nightgown. She could almost see him driving locomotives through the holes in a story she hadn’t even told. The dress was clean, no rips, no tears. It was old, yes, but every hole in it had been there a week ago.

He hummed.

Before he could piece together something, their maid, Honey, pushed into the room with a tray of food. Her face lit up when she saw Cecil sitting up, awake and alive, and, had she been a less practical girl, would have dropped the tray in delight, but instead she set it carefully on the armoire before turning to sit next to the small bundle.

Unlike Cecil’s father tackling her, Honey was a calm girl. Sitting on the other side of Cecil and placing her hands on Cecil’s knees. The two girls, for once in their lives, shared a long and silent gaze.  
The half smile, half disbelief in Honey’s face was mirrored in Cecil’s. Honey’s hand’s were the warmest thing she’d ever felt. They pressed down into her and Cecil wondered if this was happening? Was this all it took? She moved her hands and pressed them over Honey’s, making to grasp them gently, intertwine their fingers and never let her go. But Cecil’s hand didn’t grip anything but bony knees and blanket. Their eyes had never strayed from each others until then. Cecil let her eyes fall on her knees. Had she imagined Honey’s hands there? No they had certainly been there…Cecil looked back up for Honey, for her warm brown eyes, but Honey had turned away, returned her attention to the tray of porridge and tea.

No. Nothing had changed.

The frosty air that permeated the house, which Cecil had mistakenly believed had cleared, filled her lungs more sharply than before. She suddenly became aware of how weak she felt, how big the bed felt, and how far away everything and everyone was, even with her father half tangled with her.

She slumped back into the headboard, looking away from the both Honey and her father.

Honey, a professional denier, started to fill the air with her hot air.

“You would not believe it,” Honey started. Shooing her dad aside so she could take his place with her tray. Despite years of protest, Honey began feeding Cecil small spoonfuls of porridge, “There were people in and out of this place every day—even through the storm. People were helping me with chores and there were prayer circles. Protestant prayer circles!” She laughed airily, and beside her dad chuckled as well, leaning against the headboard a comfortable chasm away. Honey continued, “The town witch even came and purified your room of ‘bad spirits’.” Her fingers wiggled and she rolled her eyes, “She claimed she would contact you in the afterlife. THEN she convinced everyone that you were at peace because she couldn’t contact your spirit.”

Cecil glanced at her dad. He grinned back at her, “What? I didn’t have the strength to throw anyone out. At the time it was…” He grimaced, “Slightly annoying. But now it’s always fun to entertain her.”

He winked at Cecil who shook her head.

“I don’t recall receiving a call from her, but…”

Hone laughed, interrupting anything else Cecil would have mumbled out, by coaxing a spoonful of the mudge into her mouth, “It’s all hogwash. I would have thrown her out, but I was trying to entertain half the town. The witch seemed to be keeping people calm. But oh my god, there were so many people.

“They did enough chores to last a lifetime—if only,” she thumbed away something that had spilled from Cecil’s numb eating, then wiped her thumb clean on her apron, “The cellar is filled with all kinds of things.” She patted her legs excitedly. “The Lord visited, isn’t that wonderful?”

Dad scoffed beside them. Cecil resisted the urge to glance accusingly at him.

“The entire Silver family came to visit, even Lady Isabella.”

Cecil dipped her head back. And they were all gone now. She didn’t even have to ask if they were going to be invited back now that the main event was actually in the house. The answer was a hard and loud No.

“They were very polite,” Honey said, waving the spoon at dad, “Despite someone’s cold shoulder. Lady Isabella even offered to paint a portrait of you as a condolence gift. Very thoughtful of her, in my opinion, don’t you agree, sir?”

Her dad merely grunted in reply, patting Cecil’s hand that he had almost been holding.

“Why not invite them over again? I could sit like a corpse for several hours for the lady, we could use a portrait of my stupid face,” Cecil drolled sarcastically, dodging a spoonful Honey tried to stab into her blabbering mouth. Once the edge spilled out of Cecil, she couldn’t stop, “I want to see them. If they’re thoughtful enough to come mourn for me, someone they know hates them, why can’t I be thoughtful enough to thank them for caring??”

“They know they’ll see you around, eventually,” Dad cut in, an edge in his voice, too. A glance at him told Cecil he was doing his best to remain calm and civil with her, “No need for them to haunt around here and crowd you.”

“Of course!” Honey interjected, “They’ll see you in town, or at the Christmas Feast, or something. Who wants to be crowded with attention when they’ve just come back from life? Especially someone as delicate as you, Cecil.”

Cecil nodded bitterly, not bothering to lean forward to accept the tea Honey was pushing on her.

The conversation, at least with dad there, was over. He gathered his crutches and left without a further word. Cecil knew he’d come back eventually, but they’d struck a nerve with each other and he never liked fighting this fight.

“Don’t mind him. You know how he gets whenever the Silvers are mentioned.”

Cecil nodded, sipping the hot water. When he was gone and the door was shut, Honey let up on drowning Cecil. Sighing.

“But, I understand why he’s acting like…that. He was…destroyed while you were gone. I barely recognized him.”

Cecil leaned back against the headboard again, not trying to betray residual guilt welling inside her.

“I was the one who found your window, he just thought you were sleeping in. I didn’t know what to do, obviously. Your room was covered in snow and your curtains were actually frozen solid. I was in shock. When I told your father he fainted.”

Cecil’s eyes widened, her fingers clenching under the blanket.

“I know, I couldn’t believe it, either! He fainted right in the kitchen, shattered the mug he was using to drink his coffee. I had no idea what to do! I started cleaning up the coffee—” she laughed nervously, “—of course it’s stupid to think about now, but I thought I’d be fired if I let his coffee stain the floor. I didn’t want him to cut himself on the shattered pieces of the mug. He woke up as I was dumping his mug in the trash. He was a little bewildered, I’ve never fainted, but it was like he’d accidentally fallen asleep. It only lasted for a minute before he was going a mile a minute. He, I swear it, he practically ran out the door, me chasing after him with his coat and boots. The stable boy was just getting into the stable when your dad comes running at him. The poor guy nearly fainted himself. Your dad is scary when he’s coming at you.”

Honey laughed to herself, but Cecil didn’t return the sentiment. She really wished Honey would stop.

“We got the stable boy up on Murmur and sent him into town to look for you, ask if anyone had seen you, whatever. By that point your dad was shaking. He was convinced someone had crawled in your window and kidnapped you. And of course, we had no idea where to even start looking because of the snow! We couldn’t go looking for footprints or send a dog after you because the snow covered everything up,” Honey sighed hard. Cecil wondered how it had affected her? Had she been scared? Honey didn’t seem about to go into detail about that, “Of course no one found hide nor hair of you that day.

“I insisted I spend the night with your dad, by that point he was…a completely different man than the one I knew. As far as I know he never slept. He was drunk that next morning. He drank all night, I guess. I couldn’t believe it,” she exhaled and patted her legs, “I had to try and figure out how to sober him up because people started showing up to the house every minute on the minute. At first he practically sat on the door, totally convinced the next person coming through would bring some news about you.” Honey shrugged helplessly, “He lost hope pretty quickly, I guess. Holed up in his study and didn’t talk to anyone. I was stuck entertaining everyone.”

She at least had the tact to slow down and ponder the next subject.

“We all knew that wherever you were, you couldn’t have made it far in this snow. That blizzard completely covered the countryside. No one could have run off with you and you couldn’t have made it far in the snow on foot—or so we thought,” she regarded Cecil in bewilderment, “You certainly are a mystery.”

Cecil nodded, looking away. Her fingers were starting to get sore, clenched into each other. To combat the soreness, they started bitterly fighting at each other, finger tearing at finger, nail ripping at nail.

“It felt like everyone in town was constantly coming in and out. My mom organized the meals and I basically cooked and tried to keep tabs on your dad. It was hectic and…” Honey trailed away.

Cecil trailed back to her, filling in blank after blank. Hectic and what? Hectic and sad? Hectic and empty? Hectic and I never want to see something like that ever again, please, okay? I know you can’t control whatever voodoo happened, but please don’t let it happen again.

“It was nice,” she continued, “having people around, helping me clean, preparing food, taking care of the house. No one knew what to do because…your dad wouldn’t talk to anyone and it was…just confusing all around. I still can’t believe you’re here.” Honey reached over and put her hand on Cecil’s knee, “And alive!” She shook her head, the hand retracting already, “You are a thing of mystery, Cecil.”

“Kind of a shame everyone didn’t stick around so I could talk to them. I was barely lucid yesterday.”

Honey shook her head, getting up, “I’m sure people will come around and wish you well. If not! Whenever you’re feeling up to it—and the snow is gone, with your dad’s permission—we’ll walk to town or something. They’ll see you around. Christmas is coming, who knows.”

She stacked the bowl of porridge and the cup of tea onto the tray. Both were only half empty, but Cecil could tell Honey was dangerously close to something resembling feelings, the topic cutting too close to her heart and Honey had to get out. Cecil wished she could do the same thing, but she was pretty sure that if she tried to get up she’d wobble over like overcooked spaghetti.

“Yeah, they’ll see me around,” Cecil parroted.

“Exactly! I’ll be right back, okay?” Honey paused her busywork to regard Cecil.

“I’ll be right here,” Cecil limply held up a finger gun paired with a sloppy wink that probably closer resembled a lazy blink. Honey laughed and shook her head anyways, exiting out the door.  
Cecil went limp against the head board, releasing tension she didn’t know she’d been holding.

It sure was good to be back.

 

The day went on like so: Honey telling her of the wonderful party that was had while Cecil was gone while Cecil sat there and never got a word in ever. That was normal, though. Honey was good at babbling and Cecil was good at being a quiet wall to talk at. Cecil didn’t really have much to say and she liked it that way, she guessed. Not to mention, the threat of saying something incriminating loomed in the air every time the fatal question was raised: “What happened?”

Granted, it was never verbally said after the first time, but the question hung in the air. The conversation had gaps and the question shadowed everything. They never pressed it and Cecil never offered up anything. Even the most innocent of quirked eyebrows and lingering silences were met with the weakest, meagerest shrug. How could something that weak be expected to shoulder a question that heavy? She couldn’t possibly bear to tell her story as she was. Give the poor girl a week, maybe five, to recover.

Cecil tried to rationalize with herself that she was entitled this distance. She filed them under the feelings, which she shouldn’t be having in the first place, boiling inside her, silently. Her imposed silence fit nicely next to her jealousy, anger, and abandonment.

Honey rarely left Cecil’s side, but Honey was nothing. Honey was as Honey was. She talked constantly and said nothing. That was how she liked it. Honey wasn’t dumb. She intentionally stepped around anything meaningful and consequential. The result was, while acting as Cecil’s one outlet to the outside world, her view on the world ended up framed with gossip and trite things. Today was no different, she babbled away with three days worth of gossip to let Cecil in on everything while not really letting Cecil in on nothing at all.

Her dad, on the other hand, was in and out of her room all day. He left for extended periods of time only to come back and sit in like he couldn’t get enough of her. He’d sit too close, head leaned on Cecil’s shoulder like he was the kid and she was the parent. He’d hold her hand and squeeze it occasionally to remind her that she was still real and he was still there. The suffocating space which had existed between them always gone, just like that. Replaced with cumbersome closeness.

It was what Cecil had always wanted, er, well mostly.

She couldn’t fault the system that he was _bad_ at it. He’d never held her hand freely like this before, she couldn’t fault him that he hesitated to reach out for her or that he was quick to let go.

Yet.

It boiled inside her: was this really all it took to receive some stupid attention? A short flirt with death and she was showered in all the attention she could ever ask for?? All her half-hearted attempts would have been given more umpf had she only known something vaguely real would have given her even a few of her heart’s deepest desires.

Of course it did put a hitch onto the task Death had given her. Hard to prove life would be better without her when her father had drank himself drunk and fainted when she was gone. Two things she’d never seen him do before.

Worse of all, it set her on fire with shame. _She did that_. She made him drink. She made him faint. She made him shut himself away. She made him lose all hope of ever seeing her again. What great irony, she was a bane to his existence even when she wasn’t around. Even when she was trying to free him from her oppression she continued to weigh on him.

She didn’t think she could sell that to Death. _I make him suffer whether I’m here or not, I might as well not_. The fart probably wouldn’t buy that. Not to mention Cecil could barely stand the idea while her father was sitting next to her. With him next to her, his weight on her shoulder, his small hands in her large, she couldn’t fathom getting up and leaving it all behind. Not that she could physically get up in the first place.

Of course her hands felt much larger when empty and the weight became unbearable when it was no longer there.

 

After dinner he sent Honey home.

“Are you sure?” Cecil heard Honey from the other side of the door.

“I’m sure, Honey. Go home, you’ve been here for days, we can handle ourselves for the night. Stop worrying. We’ll both still be here in the morning.”

“Shouldn’t I at least stay until she gets her strength back?”

“You might be here forever, _patatina_. Just go home.”

It was silent for a moment, followed by a sigh, “Okay. Let me say goodbye.”

Cecil, who was slumped over a pillow, pretending she couldn’t hear them talking just beyond the door, opened an eye when the door opened. Talking all day had worn her out. Not to mention recovering from the brink of starvation was a slow process. Ironically, eating was the slowest of all. Cecil was completely tuckered out, but she still smiled at her dad’s nickname for Honey. _Patatina._ Little potato. It never ceased to bring a smile to her lips.

Honey came in and paused by the bed, smiling down at Cecil, “I’m going to head home.”

Cecil nodded, shifting onto her back to see Honey better.

“You better be here when I come back in the morning.”

“Someone’d hafta drag me outta this bed,” Cecil slurred sluggishly, “Cuz…I am not…getting up.”

Honey smiled at her, “Sounds good. I’ll hold you to that.” She waved, “Goodnight, Cecil.”

“Night-o, _patatina_.” Cecil managed a wave back. Honey waved again, shaking her head to hide the grin. Cecil grinned back. She knew Honey didn’t know what it meant and that was part of its sweetness.

“I’ll see you out,” Dad said from the door and Honey turned, with another goodnight, and walked out leaving Cecil sprawled on the bed wanting more. Cecil knew she had to go, but she felt like she was fourteen again. Begging her dad to let Honey stay the night…with the exception that Honey probably didn’t want to spend the night. Even if Cecil had the energy to talk all night and Honey didn’t have to work the next morning, she wouldn’t be vying to stay. That was the nice thing about Honey, she wasn’t making it hard for Cecil, Cecil was making it hard for herself.

A few minutes later her dad returned, crutching over to her with a smile, “Tired, _bambina_?”

“Nah,” Cecil mumbled, her eyes barely open.

He smiled and pushed aside parts of blanket, sitting on the bed slowly.

“Hey, dad.”

“Mm?”

“Where’re you sleepin’? Since I took res-dence over your bed?”

“Wherever god knocks me out, I suppose.” He grinned at her. “Not that that’s anything new.”

She smiled back, “You should take the bed.”

He shook his head, “Me? Sleep in a bed? Don’t flatter me! I haven’t used this old thing in years.”

“You think that’s an excuse, but it’s not.”

“Seems like a good excuse to me.”

She stuck her tongue out at him and flicked her fingers at him. He was just out of reach of her dangerous fingers, “It’s a good bed and you’re puttin’ it to shame.”

“In all honesty, I’m parked in the parlor and I’m perfectly fine there, _bambina, grazie mille_.”

She nodded her head, half sarcastic, half resigned.

“You need it more than I do, right now.”

“I guess.”

“Something wrong with it?”

“I just miss my room.”

He hummed, “When you get back your strength you can move back to your room. But I need you down here for now. I hate going up stairs, you know.” He tapped his crutches on the floor for emphasis. Took ten whole minutes to climb the stairs up and another to go down. God help him if he forgot something downstairs.

“Yeah, I know.”

“If there’s anything that’d make you feel more at home, or help you recover, just name it.”

She looked at him, and through the tiredness she held some semblance of deep gratitude. She hoped he could see it, “Could you maybe…read to me?” She asked, sheepish.

“Have anything in mind?”

“Not really, something exciting, maybe.”

“I’ll see what I can find.” He patted her hand lightly before leaning carefully on a crutch and standing up, “Be right back.”

She watched him leave, but was fast asleep before he came back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHY AM I SO BAD AT CHAPTER PACING AAAAAAA


	3. Chapter 3

The next morning Cecil woke drearily. The house was still with the earliest morning haze and the air was thick with inactivity. There was a dim gray-black light drawling through the curtains covering the windows.

A surge of fear spiked through Cecil—her broken heart beat like a wild beast threatening to break free of its cage. She had fallen over in her stupor—she was no longer leaning against the tree—buried and paralyzed on her side. Her breathing became labored and rough and she tried to fight for the feeling in her arms and legs. Her eyes jerked back and forth around here, trying to recall where she was, where the skeleton trees and thick bushes were. Had she died? Was this a coffin? Was this what death was like??

The tightness in her chest threatened to break, twisting and winding inside her until she gasped, all the tension releasing at once.

The snow that was covering her wasn’t snow at all, but quilts and blankets, keeping her warm and cozy. She threw them off anyways, suddenly claustrophobic. The coldness immediately bit at her, but she didn’t care. She was too shaken to care about anything.

Even though she knew without a doubt she was safe, fear ate through her, ripping her nerves at the seams and leaving her a broken and mauled mess.

Why had no one come to get her?? Why didn’t they search the woods?? Not even Death bothered to look for her! He’d accused her of lying. How could she lie about the foot and a half of undisturbed snow covering her? Why, even after insisting she wasn’t lying, had he turned his nose up at her? She wasn’t even good enough to die. Even when the concept and reality of dying terrified her to her core, she still felt completely empty at the reality that freaking Death didn’t want her. Honey didn’t want her. Her dad didn’t want her. Sam and Nathaniel didn’t want her. Obadiah didn’t want her. No dumb boy wanted her. Might as well add the guy who takes babies and mothers. Even he can have standards!

He was stringing her along, pretending to want her, but in reality, even he couldn’t bear the idea of being forced to sit through however long eternity is.

Cecil told herself that beyond a shadow of a doubt she hadn’t done it for attention. It had always been for release. For herself and for them. It had never been for attention—had it been for attention she would have told someone, obviously. Cecil hadn’t even left a note. Not a real one, at least. O-or an obvious one. She didn’t want anyone thinking she’d done it so people would love her more. Her reasons were completely noble! She was a spurge on the world and she desired to weed herself out.

But after two days of eternity and isolation, so completely exhausted she couldn’t even lift a finger, all she’d wanted in the world was for someone to come get her. When she closed her eyes she’d imagined something to hold, someone to hold her, comfort her. The reality of it all was much less romantic, but not surprising.

_I don’t want her._

_I don’t want her either._

_You had her first._

_You had her second._

Cecil had never been afraid of anything, let alone the dark, but when she closed her eyes and opened them only to see stifling, blinding darkness, she couldn’t help but be afraid she was alone in the woods again, abandoned by anything and everything with no one to save her.

What a ridiculous thought. Who did she expect to save her? Her dad had been “trying to save her” all her life and all he’d managed was to make her a lukewarm body floating from day to day. Had she honestly expected someone from town to save her? The people she only sees anymore once or twice a year when she’s let out of the house on Honey’s steel leash? Or the boyfriends Cecil had dropped like a rock? Of course they would be itching to be her hero, right? Or even Honey herself? Best friend Honey. She’d come and throw her over her shoulder like the heroes from her romance novels. A real Heathcliff.

In her mind of minds, she understood that her father was bound to his crutches and he couldn’t have come for her. Wouldn’t have, either. He would have crumbled in the snow before he got two feet into the wood. But Honey? Perfectly healthy perfect Honey hadn’t come out for her? And if her father didn’t feel comfortable sending a woman for her—all those people that were in the house, could one villager not come into the woods to find her? Cecil understood—she did—that no one knew where to look, no one knew what to look for, and no one knew why she’d disappeared. A superstitious town wouldn’t have gone questioning why the weird changeling girl disappeared. They wouldn’t have tested the fae.

Cecil understood this.

But Cecil had survived the first night and she’d expected someone to come gather her up and take her home. She’d specifically picked where she went because she was sure she would die in the night and whatever search party sent after her would find her body to return to her father, and easily so. She had been just fifty paces from the house for god’s sake!  
Someone save her? Don’t make her laugh.

Cecil rolled over in the bed and finally realized tucked into bed with her was one of her favorite muslin bunnies.

“Hello…” Cecil’s early morning voice rasped, but her bunny wouldn’t care. Bunnies, specifically muslin ones, have very understanding dispositions.

She stroked her long, well-loved ears. Cecil wondered who had brought her down and settled on that it must have been Honey. She must have come in early for work and brought down her bunny, knowing that Cecil would need someone to comfort her even when she was alone. Honey had always disapproved of the toys, but she must have been coming around for Cecil’s sake.

God, Cecil loved Honey.

The thought and action warmed Cecil immensely and, wrapped up with her bunny and blankets once more, she managed to go back to sleep.

 

Cecil jerked and opened her mouth, but it was only filled with water. Pressure—and more pressure built on her. She could feel herself drowning—the snow was curving onto her, she was being pulled apart, and in front of everyone’s eyes. Hel _p_ , he _lp_ , h _elp_ , _help_. The mantra screamed in the background, filling every empty space between her. The people, seeming to hear her jumped to action. Coming at her with, their feet raised and stomping the snow down, down, down. Packing the earth on top of hEr—

With a loud gasp, Cecil gasped awake. Her fingers were dug into the bedding around her, mouth open and gulping air in. Her shoulders were tense against her body, legs braced stiff against the bed. Terrified still, and confused, her eyes whipped around the room, jerking past each mundane board and panel.

Her eyes cut past Honey and the splattered mess of a breakfast tray at her feet, only to return to them and the fearful look mirrored on both the girls’ faces.

Before Cecil could even realize what they were doing, Honey bolted from the room.

In response, Cecil fell onto the bed, exhausted and panting audibly. She had no idea what the hell was going on, but she hated that someone had seen it. With a shaky hand, she wiped at her face. She was covered in a sticky layer of sweat and grime and her hair was matted around her shoulders.

Hardly a minute later, the tell-tale sound of dad’s crutches running down the hall echoed through the room. The moment she heard him he was breaking through the door, “Cecil—what happened?? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she rasped weakly, dropping her arm onto the bed.

Honey immediately started gathering the scattered mess of tin plates and bowls, apologizing as she did. Dad definitely didn’t care about some spilled food and he didn’t stop at the door to even give Honey the impression that he did. Quickly leaping bedside, he leaned on one crutch and placed the back of his hand on Cecil’s forehead.

“ _Dio mio_ , Cecil,” he gasped, feeling over her face, “You’re burning up. Honey—don’t worry about that Honey— _per favore_ —make her some of the tea tonic. N-no, leave it—leave it, she needs the tonic more than the floors need to be cleaned.”

Honey reluctantly left the half piled mess on the tray and left the room.

Cecil eyed her dad wearily, “I’m fine…”

He shook his head, turning his attention to the accumulated medical utensils on the nightstand. There was a wide variety, but he immediately went for the thermometer, picking it up and shaking it before offering it to her, “Aah.”

“Aaaah,” she mimicked sarcastically, despite her exhaustion. He stuck the thermometer in her mouth, thus shutting her up for a good five minutes. She knew he knew better to take her temperature right after waking up and he knew she knew it, too. He just wanted to assure her quietness for a few minutes. What for, her mind couldn’t possibly process at the moment.

He didn’t say anything for the first couple minutes, writing things down in her medicine book he’d moved to her room for easy access. She watched him, her eyes blearily trying to close and never open again. When he finished writing, he put the book down. Her eyes blinked closed again and, while she was temporarily asleep, he quickly pressed something warm and gritty to her forehead. She groaned.

“Drrrd…”

“Hey, no talking,” he scolded lightly, “Now it has to set all over again. Another five minutes.”

Cecil rolled her eyes, settling on him wearily. She managed to quirk her eyebrows up just slightly. He knew exactly what the quirk was for.

“Honey thought you were possessed,” he said, shrugging lamely. He playfully put a bit of the salve on her nose, making her scrunch it up in distaste, “You know how people are…She feels better with this… _folle_ … _sciocchezze_ …ritual…”

He smeared more of the salve on her cheeks and chin.

“Ewhi du you hawbe it in here?”

“Cecil, not talking,” he scolded, booping her nose again, “I have it in here because Honey is a pearl clutcher sometimes.” He shook his head, “She thinks you caught some spirits wherever you were.” He examined his work on Cecil’s face. Sometimes he drew faces or pictures, depended on if Honey would see it or not, she had a feeling he’d just swiped it on and left it. He covered the tin and set it down on the nightstand, “But I don’t agree with her.”

Cecil watched his face, his eyes had been settling on anything but her. He watched his hand on the nightstand for a long moment before he finally looked at her.

“ _Cecilia_ ,” Her birth name. She hated it. He knew that, not that it stopped him. He only said it when he wanted to soften a blow to their hearts and to distract her reaction with the initial distaste of her deadname. “You know I would never judge you…”

She rolled her head away from him, rolling the thermometer under her tongue. She didn’t know what he was going to say, but she didn’t want to hear it. The stupid superstitious anti-faerie salve of stupid stupidness smeared on her face threatened to rub off and anti-faerie her pillow.

“If something happened…or…” He rolled the taste of the words around in his mouth, considering their weight, “If someone did something…to…you…I won’t judge you. You know I would never judge you.”

She remained quiet, neither looking at him nor betraying any bit of the story trapped inside her. His eyes were heavy on her, though, and she couldn’t walk away from his gasp like this. Her only hope was that Honey would come back any minute with the tonic punch to the throat. If she was asleep, no one could ask her heart wrenching questions!

“Was it a nightmare?”

She nodded. There was no use lying to him about it.

“You can tell me,” he assured her again, “I won’t punish you or guilt you, I just want to know, _bambina_ , what happened. Did it have anything to do with the nightmare?”

After a long moment of harsh silence, Cecil shrugged limply. Her shoulders barely lifting.

He hummed softly, deciding the ruse with the thermometer was enough and motioned in her peripheral for her to let him take it out. She moved her head and opened her mouth.

“What’s the prognosis, doc?” Cecil rapsed.

He grimaced, looking at the thermometer.

“Am I dyin’?”

“Cecil.”

“Tell me it ain’t a hard case of _The Deaths_.”

“Cecil—” He snapped, shooting a furious look down at her, “It’s not funny.”

She rolled her eyes gloomily, hunching her shoulders into the pillows, “It’s funny to me…” She grumbled, gripping her fingers into a fist under the blankets.

“Today isn’t the day,” he muttered back, trading the thermometer for the notebook, writing her temperature down, no doubt. He muttered the numbers in Italian, along with a few other choice words.

Cecil rolled her eyes and used half her energy to physically roll onto her side, away from him.

She heard him sigh behind her, “Cecil, you’ll get that stuff all over the bed. Careful, please?”

She merely grunted in reply, but turned her face and body off the bed, laying flat on her back looking directly at the ceiling. Her stomach rumbled weakly. Her breakfast was in a puddle on the floor. Stomach, it’s a shame to say, but you’re not getting fed this morning. All you’re getting is whisky mixed with tea and some cough syrup (more whisky with a healthy dose of morphine).

“Talking about things make it easier, you know.”

She knew. This wasn’t the first time he’d said this to her. Probably wouldn’t be the last.

“You know I’m here to listen.”

_You wouldn’t understand._

“I wouldn’t judge you, you know that. I just want to understand.”

“I’m tired.”

“You just woke up.”

“ _Tired_.”

He hummed, did he understand?, “You have a fever, hopefully the tonic will help with the terrors, but if you need any other kind of help, you know where to find me.”

She nodded.

He put down the notebook and leaned on his crutches, righting himself to carry himself out. Just as he approached the door, it opened with Honey carefully holding a steaming cup of tonic.

Honey’s tense shoulders immediately dropped when she saw Cecil’s face with the superstitious dirt smeared on it. She turned her attention to Dad, stopped near the door, “Is everything okay?”

“Fine. She’s ready.” He moved awkwardly aside to let her pass while he waited next to the door.

Honey set her tray on the bed and helped Cecil sit up enough to drink. Cecil cast a pathetic glance at her dad. As soon as she drank this the day would be gone. She’d wake up with another day she could have lived to her miserable extent stolen to nasty medicine. Residual resentment boiled inside her whenever she had to take medicine ever since her dad called her _un cane_. A dog. Dogs fight taking medicine. Big girls don’t.

She grabbed the cup with her hand, Honey couldn’t jerk her fingers away if she had to hold the cup. Cecil gripped at Honey’s fingers and the cup with a strength tucked deep inside her and glanced up at Honey to see the uncomfortable look flash across her face. Whatever.

“I’m ready to be a corpse for a few hours,” Cecil joked, jerking the cup and their hands at her face, taking a rough swig of the disgusting tea concoction. She coughed hard and Honey jerked the cup away. Cecil looked up at her and the distorted look of disgust on her face.

“What’s wrong with you today?” Honey’s eyes searched her dirt covered face.

Cecil didn’t know what to do and the dam was already broken, “Nothing’s. Is there something wrong with wanting my meds?” She grabbed the cup again and managed another careless, too big slop. She coughed again, more violently than before. Her body throwing itself at the edge of the bed. She gasped and coughed, holding onto the bed with her skinny arms. Her bones felt rattled and her stomach burned. Cecil managed a twisted look up at Honey whose face was still mingled with surprise and a tint of fear.

“Enough, enough, Honey, that’s enough for her.” Her father cut in and the sound of him pushing Honey aside with his crutch barely came through her coughing. His small hand patted at Cecil’s back before starting to usher a shocked Honey away. “We’ll leave you alone—let you sleep."

Cecil looked up at them as they herded themselves out the door. She limply waved a hand, “I’ll just be in here—” A swift and hard cough interrupted her, leaving her voice more raw than before “—Dying. Like usual.”

Her dad’s face turned nasty as he pushed out the door. She could almost hear the harsh _cut it out_ in his expression.

She collapsed back onto the bed as he shut the door. It wasn’t immediate, but she eventually fell asleep. As they say: you can’t be possessed if you’re in a coma.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Obviously Honey is superstitious and Marcello takes advantage of the fact that she can't google "does putting mud salves on someone's face suppress the evil demon possessing their soul?"
> 
> Also: I realize and am fully aware of the modern use of "deadname" being a thing that trans people use in regards to their deadname birthname. It's not implying that Cecil's a transman, but I wanted to use it because it carries a sort of dread and anxiety around the name. And it DOES fall in line, vaguely, with the trans usage of deadname. But you'll find out when you find out.   
> (Message me if you want to talk about it, I'm open to changing it).


	4. Chapter 4

It was like her first day back, awake, asleep, awake? No, no asleep. For sure. Wait. Awake?—No, wait, no, yes, no that was a dream. There is no awake, there is no sleep.

Day three gone without a chance to convince herself and the world she wasn’t needed.

Day four passed in relative isolation. Honey, her father told her, wouldn’t come in until she was certain Cecil was devoid of all demons.

“Going to have to cut out my heart for that one,” Cecil joked only to be met with a rough glare.

“Uncalled for, _Cecilia_. You’re being incredibly ungrateful and inconsiderate to what she’s going through.”

Cecil shut up.

“It wasn’t like while you were gone we were celebrating here. It was hard on us. You won’t tell us what happened and then act like this? I don’t know what I expected. We were genuinely terrified we’d lost you and now I’m not sure what I think.”

Cecil took her medicine without a word. She let him listen to her breathing and take her heart rate. He looked at her throat. He looked at her eyes. He looked at her ears. He wrote it all down in his Book of Cecil.

Then he let her alone with she, herself, and her thoughts.

Not like Cecil wanted to see Honey’s stupid face, anyway. Or her dad’s. They could…whatever or something. Cecil couldn’t think straight, but they could definitely do something vile for all she cared. They clearly didn’t seem to give a care about what she was going through day-in-day-out.

_You’re being incredibly ungrateful and inconsiderate to what she’s going through._

Cecil didn’t have a damn clue what she was going through. Honey hadn’t said one word except about how happy she’d been when people had been in the house. If she was upset, why would Cecil need to know? It’s not like being cared about is really important and validating to know or whatever…

Honey was everything Cecil used to be. She only brought up fractured memories of what it was like before everything had fallen apart. Honey was _Honey_. To this very day, was bubbly and sweet, shy at times, and always ever so wonderful to be around. But, for Cecil it was hard to be around her. So who cared if she thought she had demons in her? Cecil did, they were called cystic tissues and hemophilia.

Cecil was two years older than her. A head taller than her. A lifetime skinnier than her. Honey was all sparkles and smiles and energy and Cecil was in the process of dying one day at a time. Honey’s dark brown eyes were warm and melted snow, Cecil’s bleached eyes were tired and pale. Honey’s freaking hair was blonde, no, maybe brown, no! Maybe blonde! Depends on all the sun caught in her perfect, sleek tresses. Cecil’s hair was terse and tangled. Black. Bweh.

They were friends. They’d always been friends. Good friends. Best friends.

What did they like to do together?

When she was thirteen and Honey eleven, as her dad slowly lost control of his legs, him succumbing to crutches and Cecil barely able to breathe, Honey’s family had indentured her until she was eighteen. It’d been her dad’s request, but Honey and Cecil were already good friends. Best! Friends. Who wouldn’t want to be paid to be friends with someone?

Honey was more of a best friend for Cecil than a helping hand for her dad at first. Back then Cecil, despite the problems that had always been there, had energy for almost anything. At least enough energy to follow along after Honey like a little sister. Cecil even already had had a big sister, and she still flopped after someone two years younger than her. She would traipse about with Honey any and everywhere. Do any and everything with her. Best friends. Good friends. The best of friends.

Of course Cecil’s energy, and in turn, her personality, had inverted and caved in on itself until nothing was left but a shell after her body decided to take the slowest, most annoying spiral towards death.

She watched the shadows of the clouds drifting across the old, wallpapered ceiling. The light coming from the window was white, following the path of faded yellow paper across the ceiling from sixty years of the sun following the same path with the same trees in the same way. There used to be delicate white flowers on it, but sixty years is a long time for a flower to live.

She sighed, talking aloud to herself. “Best friends. Yeah.”

“Something wrong.”

Cecil’s body jerked and tensed, her head jerking towards the window. Who—what—how— _who_ — _what_ — _how_ —

Lord Death leaned against the window, his stupid smirk and his dark aura in tow. Her heart twisted and threatened to stop—only to be replaced with a confused and shamed anger. She couldn’t begin to place the sudden hatred his mere presence—and the embarrassment of how much he really had scared her—caused. She gritted her teeth together and slapped her head back on the pillow.  
He wasn’t casting a shadow. Her eyes stayed furiously glued to the ceiling and the clouds and the sun kept rolling past the window shining on the ceiling. Her mind briefly rolled through the idea of _is he really here??_ with no answer.

Her eyes fell to the door.

“I’m real, Cecil.”

She gave in and glanced at him. He’d sounded so genuine she almost didn’t even believe that. Lord Death? Be anything other than a pretentious jerk? She must be imagining things. But he seemed real enough. She didn’t trust her body to recreate the feelings he gave her. How alive she felt when he loitered near her. The energy. The, uh, yeah. She looked over him lightly, not letting her eyes linger or betray anything, not her doubt or her wants. “Are you?”

He cocked his head slightly. He hadn’t expected this kind of reaction. He didn’t really know what this reaction was at all. He leaned off the window and strode across the room, his boots making a heavy sound with each step. She glanced at the door, terrified if it really were real, Honey would hear this and come in to see him. Him!! And her dead of a heart attack at 19 years old. In that brief flick of her eyes, he pressed his hands hard on the bed, making it creak and the mattress give.

She jolted upright, slapping a hand over her mouth to keep from shouting and contorting her body as she did. Half of her wanted to push him away the other half wanted to push herself off the bed. She threw half her covers as she attempted to make sense of half her body pushing at him and the other at him.

For a pregnant moment the two stared at each other, Cecil wide eyed and him leaning on the bed pleased with himself.

She squared her shoulders, whipping her hand off her mouth and slapping it down to the bed, “D-don’t get on this bed!”

“I wouldn’t unless you asked me to.”

“I d-don’t—and I would never—so—so don’t.” She stammered out, pink in the cheeks.

“I just wanted to convince you I’m real.”

“You convinced me,” she hissed, stiffly relaxing her fight or flight muscles against the headboard. Her fingers were steel bars around the blanket. This stupid man. “That wasn’t funny.”

He straightened up, “I thought it was.” He nosed her dad’s rocking chair to face the bed and began loosening the cords of his cloak, readying to pull it off completely.

“S-stop! Don’t undress!” Cecil hissed, pink in the cheeks. She pulled the covers up over her legs subconsciously.

He paused, clearly amused, “I’m not naked under my cloak.”

“No—no you can’t take it off, I—I don’t want you getting too comfortable.”

He shook his head, suppressing the grin inside himself. He sat, his cloak still on, in the rocking chair watching her. “Not much of a hostess are you.”

“You say that like you were even invited.”

He shrugged, smiling lightly. “I don’t need to be invited. No one’s dying.”

She rolled her eyes. He was being a shit, that was for sure. Does being a reaper require some kind of degree in sassiness? She wasn’t into it. “Yeah. No one.”

“I get bored in the winters around here.”

“I bet you do. What with the fact there isn’t one d—a single person dying around here.”

“Not one damn person dying, indeed.”

“Damn.” She repeated, annoyed. She could curse. She could. He didn’t have to make fun of her. “Don’t you have anything better to do? Don’t you have children to murder and loved ones to take?”

“Not so much around this time of year.”

“Why…” Cecil’s heart twisted. “Oh.”

_Who do you think it’s going to be this year?_

She closed her eyes.

_Cecil._

“Why are you here.” She muttered, rubbing at her face to keep feelings from rising up from some pit of hell inside her. “Is it just to torment me?”

“Just checking in on you and our wager.”

“Yeah. I’m real sure.” She smoothed the blankets she’d half thrown, pretending the terror hadn’t even happened. That nothing was happening. _Who do you think it’s going to be this year? Cecil._ Stupid wager. “If you can go wherever you want, why do I have to go out to the clearing.”

“How can I know you want it if I do all the hard work for you?”

She let out a hiss of air and drooped her shoulders. He certainly wasn’t making this marriage prospective very appealing. If he was the ‘grand prize’ she could easily do without. “You’ll know because I’ll tell you.”

“People say lots of things they don’t mean around me.”

“Not me.”

“Right.” He pushed back on the rocking chair on his heels.

He was settling in like he owned the place. Maybe he did being the harbinger of all their eventual fates. But Cecil didn’t appreciate it. She could practically feel his cockiness. All she wanted in the world at that moment was to smack the smugness out of him. She’d do anything to show him up.

He stretched out in the chair, “Like how you said you’d never ask me to get into bed with you because you’re a good girl. You never think about sex.”

Cecil’s body lurched and her eyes nearly popped out of her head. She whipped her head at him. He said WHAT. The word was sharp and startling. She couldn’t recall ever hearing the word aloud. And by a man. And at her?? And out LOUD. About her?

“Not like you don’t have books all about the subject. No romances filled to the brim about it hidden in your room because you’ve never thought about, huh.”

She ground her teeth together, face hot with anger and embarrassment. She ought to fight this man here and now if she could get her legs and mind under her. The worst was she couldn’t refute him. She _did_ have a collection of novels with something her father forbade and she thought about it _constantly_. And she couldn’t admit to that fact while refuting it for him specifically without admitting to it in the first place! She couldn’t lie and say those books weren’t real, because he could go and get one as she lied through her teeth about it. She’d promised herself to a silver ring she never wore. A man she’d never marry. She couldn’t be defiling herself thinking about something like that.

He leaned on his elbow, watching her stew in the box she was in. Continually amused with this human. What did they call them? Blushing virgins? She certainly was. “Well?”

“None of your business.” She seethed through her teeth.

“I’d say as your future husband, it does.”

Cecil hunched her shoulders like a feral cat, “You are not my future husband.”

“Oh? Then are you giving up this game? That’s fine with me.”

“No! No—I’m not giving anything up. Just you wait and see, I’ll be gone come at the end of this week. I will.”

“You’re not proving much to me.” He waved his hand lazily at the wall where behind it hid the rest of the house. “Not by hiding away in here sleeping. Being a brat to your father and friend don’t count either.”

“I’m…not being a brat,” she released the tension and melted into the bed a little, “It’s not fair—you can’t see how hard it is to prove things when I’m stuck in bed like this—and—and I’ve already proved a lot, you just are a cheat and refuse to recognize it. You know I’m right.”

“Maybe so.”

She drooped her shoulders in frustration. He was impossible. Couldn’t dying be easy?? Any stupid lug could go and get himself killed, she couldn’t see why the hell it had to be a whole ordeal for her! Couldn’t someone else do it for her? “I’ll be there and you’ll see.”

He watched her evenly, “I will.”

Before she could reply the knob in the door rattled followed by the sound of tumblers falling into place (so it had been locked). Cecil half collapsed awkwardly into bed, trying to pretend to be asleep despite her twisted position. She didn’t even want to pretend that death was there, that was a Honey or Dad problem.

The door opened and the soft footsteps of Honey followed.

“Cecil?” She whispered, padding closer. The floor creaked under her. Cecil waited and waited for a scream. There’s a man in here?? A grim reaper is sitting next to Cecil’s bed!! But Honey kept coming in, and no scream came after her. “Cecil, are you awake..?”

Cecil didn’t stir. She decided this fight wasn’t hers to fight. Again: this was a Honey problem, now.

Honey came fully into the room and Cecil heard her pushing things aside on the nightstand and setting something down before scuttling back out the room and locking the door behind her.

After a while, when she was sure the coast was clear, Cecil sat up and saw Death had disappeared and Honey had left her a slice of cake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FYI: Promise rings were traditionally made out of silver because silver was thought to be "purifying" or a symbol of "purity". Cecil's last name is normally Silver, but NOT in this au. (Unrelated to Lord Silver i swear lol)


	5. Chapter 5

He never came back after that and she was relieved he didn’t.

She ate her cake. She rolled around in bed.

She let the day roll by.

That was enough to let her die, right? She didn’t even know what she was doing. She didn’t know what kind of proof would convince him. Everything felt so real when it was just her and her misery.  Everyone suffered because she was there. Everyone was miserable that she just wallowed, drowning for years in a puddle of her own lungs.

_Who do you think it’s going to be this year?_

When Cecil broke her rib when she was seventeen, her older sister took an early break from her studies in a big city to take a train and see her. They’d all believed it was really her time to go. She couldn’t move, she couldn’t breathe, and her skin went waxy. She’d already died and her soul didn’t know it.

_Cecil._

Since Sam’s dad had died when Cecil was six and Sam fourteen, they only ever saw each other at Christmas. Sam had gone away to school and decided she loved it there more than here. Sam’s older brother, who had been twenty-nine when their dad died, had gone west and decided he loved it there more than here, too. They both wrote when they could, but they had lives that Cecil would never get to be a part of.

_What makes you say that?_

Sam came down and held her hand for one week straight. She kept waiting and waiting and waiting for that moment that Cecil’s fingers would loosen and her eyes would shut. And Cecil kept waiting, too.

_I just know._

Sam talked about all kinds of things. Her landlady had puppies. She recited all two-hundred-and-six bones in the body and all six-hundred-and-forty muscles. She named every latin name of every animal Cecil could mumble out.

Turns out Cecil wasn’t ready to die. Or at least her body and soul weren’t. Her body was a fighter and Cecil was a succumber. One morning she woke up and her hand was empty. Sam had gone back to school and never came back. She just refused to come home. Cecil supposed this wasn’t really her home anymore.

She wrote a letter to her dad: _I can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep riding this ride. I don’t care about this emotional wave you keeping riding. You said I might not get to even say goodbye and she didn’t even die. I can’t keep hurting like this, Marcello. I can’t keep up with her._ Her dad told her that Sam dealt with grief poorly. Sam and Nathaniel didn’t like to be sad. They liked to bottle it up and throw it away. Pain wasn’t worth the trouble.

Cecil agreed.

The afternoon wore on and the evening crept in only to be beat out by the night.

“Dad did you write to Sam?”

He paused at the door he was leaving, leaving, leaving, “I didn’t. No…”

“That’s good, right? She’s so whiny. I don’t need her breathing down my neck telling me to get better”

He smiled, “She can be a little dramatic.”

“Oh, she is so dramatic,” Cecil smiled back.

“Do you want me to try and see if she’ll visit for Christmas?”

“It’s okay. She might visit anyways.”

“Ah, well, you never know,” he waved his crutch loosely, awkward. Guilty. “She might. You never know.”

“Yeah, you never know.”

 

The snow crept into bed with her. The skeletons of the trees stretched over the ceiling. The cold wind. She watched the clearing grow through the floorboards of her dad’s room. A doe nosed through a deer path in the early morning and crossed in front of where Cecil was slumped, wrapped in blankets. She could hear her hooves tap on the wood as she did. She paused to nibble at the faded flowers on the wallpaper.

Behind her, nails making soft clacks on the wood, he followed. A shadow. Ragged fur. A hunched monster waiting to catch his prey.

Cecil inhaled soft and that was all it took. The doe saw the human wrapped and slumped on a mattress of snow and with a kick, jumped through the wallpaper and away.

Cecil exhaled and he turned his eyes on her. His paws leaving no prints in the snow. If he couldn’t have his doe, he could have her paralyzed in the snow.

He came closer. Smoke pouring from his mouth.

She could feel her blood on his teeth.

The ground kept stretching and he kept coming and coming. One paw in front of the other, becoming exponentially larger with each step until he was the size of a cow and he kept coming and coming, breaking and snapping the footboard as he put one paw on the bed, then the other, and then his whole body shattered and broke the mattress under them—

“What are you doing sitting up?”

Cecil opened her eyes. Her dad’s room was dark, but the light coming in behind the goddess in the door was shimmery. She looked around the room. The wallpaper was intact and devoid of nibbles. The floor was old, but unfettered by tree roots. The bed was devoid of snow and the footboard was intact.

Ah. A dream.

Cecil shrugged and leaned back against the headboard. She didn’t remember sitting up, but she had her legs criss-crossed and was wrapped deliberately in blankets. The only person who could have done this was herself, so she just chalked it up to…early…morning…yeah.

“Are you feeling better today?”

“Yeah, I am.’ It was true, Cecil was feeling better. Her body didn’t feel as frail as it had the past few days. It was the same feeling she’d felt in the clearing with him. It’d lingered longer this time.  
“That’s good!” Honey started coming in, she had a tray of food along with, oh you thought you could hide that behind a cup of tea. Cecil’s eyes zeroed in on the little brown bowl peaking out next to a teacup. Meds.

“What time is it?”

“I think it’s a little after nine,” Honey said picking up the cup of tea. “Marcello had to go out this morning, Emily has a fever and Thomas wanted to make sure it was nothing. She’s at around thirty-two weeks and Thomas was worried it might be something more sinister.” Honey offered Cecil the cup of tea which Cecil took from her, no finger touching today. “Thomas was all in a huff about her being the one this year.” She picked up the bowl of meds.

There they were again like nothing ever happened.

“Hold out your hand.”

Cecil did, but with a weak pout, but Honey glossed over it, dumping a couple of pills into Cecil’s hand.

“He’s so superstitious,” Honey shook her head, “She might be feeling feverish because of her pregnancy, it’s normal to be hot and be a woman.”

Cecil nodded swallowing with a little tea.

“Obadiah said that when I’m pregnant he won’t be a worrywart. He promised he would trust my judgment, I’m practically a midwife at this point. I told him if he was going to try and worry over me I’d try to tell him how to wrangle cows.”

Wow. Just like that. Already into the Obadiah talk. Cecil almost forgot how much Honey never stopped talking about him. She slumped back into the headboard more, holding out her hand as Honey put a couple other pills in.

“He assured me he wouldn’t be too crazy. We’re both super excited for kids, but Obadiah keeps talking about how he wants me to quit working because he would rather I stay at home. He thinks I should keep a baby since he doesn’t want to do it. Would it bother you if I did? I would still visit, of course,” she went on, barely taking the nod as a response, “Honestly, though, if Marcello wanted me to I would work with a baby on my back.”

Obadiah was the flavor of the years for Honey. Cecil had had him knocked out of her hands and Honey had caught him like a good best friend.

“Not that I think your dad would make me work with baby at all, let alone him making me work with a baby on my back—he’d probably insist on being my midwife! Oh gosh…I don’t think I could handle that—I don’t know if he could handle that either. But I don’t know, delivering is different. Unfortunate that you haven’t gotten the chance to be around many babies. I bet with how much you baby those dolls of yours you’d love a baby.”

Honey swiped at one of the bunnies sitting next to her and Cecil nodded, because at this point that was all that could be done. The bunny fell over limply on its side. Cecil immediately righted her, suppressing an annoyed look. She didn’t like her bunnies being beaten.

“I love babies so much!” Honey gushed, moving the tray over Cecil’s lap and putting the bowl now devoid of medicine on the nightstand. “I can’t wait to have one of my own. I want to have lots of children! At least a pair of both boys and girls. Obadiah agrees that we’ll start saving our money now because I was thinking we would have the boys become ministers and the girls can go to boarding schools in the city.”

Cecil picked up a fork and poked at her pudge soup porridge. Like the indentured servant of a poor townsman with six kids and the only son of a family of cowhands could afford one kid, let alone boys in the church and girls at boarding schools. _Don’t be bitter, Cecil_. _She wants to dream. Wants a better life. Can you really knock her on that? Let her dream. Let her wish. Why are you so bitter?_

“He and I are getting really serious, I think. He might inherit Walter’s land when he passes on and when he does he’ll be a landowning man and we’ll be making it big. He’ll be able to vote and hold office if he wants. And my indenture ends in March which is, what?” She started counting on her fingers, “November, December, January…February…March…” She looked at her five outstretched fingers, “Only five months away…amazing. I can’t believe it’s been seven years. In five months my indenture will be over and I’ll be able to get married. By the way Obadiah’s been talking, I think he might really consider marrying me come summer.”

“Summer marriages are bad luck, you know.” Cecil said spooning some porridge smudge into her mouth, “Witches and fae come out when its warm. If you get married in the summer a witch might seduce your husband away.”

Honey huffed, “Then we’ll get married in May. There’s nothing cursed about May, huh?”

“The only thing cursed about a May marriage is you’ll give birth in the heart of winter.”

“Oh hush, you’re so negative about everything. December is cursed this, witches come out in the summer that. You know, there’s a witch living in town and I don’t think she’d appreciate this slander.”

Cecil rested her head on her shoulder, “I think she’d take whatever attention she could get.”

Honey giggled, “She’s so insane. That séance she tried to pull in your room was so ridiculous. I would have thrown her out but she I didn’t have the heart to do it in front of Lord Silver.”

Cecil, despite herself, perked up ever so slightly.

“But you know, Obadiah’s father always sends him her way to buy her silly charms.”

Cecil deflated. Back on this horse again.

“Obadiah’s house is filled with all these little trinkets like stones wrapped in wire and dream catchers, what have you. It’s adorable really. I love him. He’s so quirky sometimes. He’s always putting charms on his favorite cows or having the witch come and draw little runes on this or that. I don’t have the heart to tell him it’s all fake. It’s neither here nor there, anyway. It’s harmless and it makes him feel better.”

Cecil shoveled food into her mouth. She was…so…tired…of hearing about Obadiah.

Obadiah with the strong arms and heavy smell of earth and straw in the summer. Tallest boy in town, almost the tallest man, only falling short after his father. Black hair, but not deathly like Cecil’s, soft and sun kissed, instead. Brown eyes and big brows. He had a chunk out of his arm that Cecil had kissed once when they were alone. He’d claimed it was from a fight with a wolf, but he’d told her it’d been from a hard fall into the river.

“Thankfully Obadiah isn’t sold by the idea. He thinks it’s clutter. Wants a clean house to raise our children in. He has a plot somewhere on Walter’s land where he’s planning to build a house for us.”  
Cecil remembered being seventeen and his strong farmer arms carrying her when she was tired and picking her up and kissing her cheek, closest thing to a kiss Cecil had ever felt. He had a huge laugh and insisted it was cute that Cecil could catch any bug in her hands and had names for different types of spiders. He’d taught her a little about plants and she’d actually remembered it. She’d grown a whole patch of flowers to wear for the midsummer’s dance under his advice. But like him, she’d never gotten to wear them.

“It’s so exciting growing up,” Honey patted her legs, “There’s so many things we can do and I can’t wait to get the chance to do it! I think Marcello was going to hire me as a full time lady of the house after I turn eighteen and Obadiah’s inheriting Walter’s land. I’m so exciiited.”

Cecil couldn’t help but feel a little jealous any and all the time about it—just—just all of it!…and she was tired of hearing about Obadiah! She didn’t want to hear Honey slip his name out one more time! She didn’t want the conversation to steer his lovesick way. Instead of biting Honey’s happy head off, Cecil just smiled her patentedly tired smile at Honey, “I’m glad life’s looking up for you. You deserve good things.”

“Thank you, Cecil,” Honey patted the bed next to Cecil’s leg.

Cecil slumped more. Just a little to the right, Honey. Just a little touch on the leg. Touch me and make me feel real, please? But Honey didn’t. Honey hated touching people. Even Obadiah didn’t get to touch her much. Why did Cecil think Honey would touch her?

“At Obadiah and I’s wedding—”

Cecil closed her eyes. She wad done. Honey could talk like no one’s business and she just did. She just kept talking and Cecil stopped listening.

Cecil had no room to talk, she guessed. Cecil had dated all of Honey’s brothers. And she had broken it off with all of them. This had been at the time in her life where she’d flit from guy to guy like a moth jumping from flame to flame. Mark to Aesop to Matthew to Obadiah to so on and so on until every man had claimed Cecil was his beau between the summers of fifteen and seventeen. She dated them for short bursts of time, from a short couple of weekish months, to forever.

None of it had lasted. None of it had mattered at all. Seventeen came and Cecil died. In her place rose a prettier, perkier model. Perfect to give flowers and hold hands, if she held hands. The Honey model had come and she, too, had beaus after beaus and men trailed after her like a veil after a bride. Unlike the dead model, Honey’s beaus lasted and lasted and lasted, to the point of being obnoxious in Cecil’s unbiased opinion. The shortest had been almost four months. Shortest! Honey must be able to stomach the idea of being held in place for more than one minute, but she’d never been bound to her bed for days or weeks, let alone years. She’d never known what it was like to only have one option.

She had, like any good best friend, had asked Cecil if it was okay if she dated Obadiah. _Would you hate me if I dated Obadiah?_ Cecil hadn’t had a chance to break up with him due to dying. They’d just faded off and he’d become a widower and her a ghost. _It’s okay, he’d be good for you_.

“…this winter is going to be so long, I cannot wait for spring. Everything good happening to me is happening in spring—”

“Honey, Honey—” Cecil managed to softly interject, not able to listen to another word about Obadiah and how happy she was going to be with him.

Honey stopped like she’d gone too far on her leash, but had forgotten it was even there in the first place, “What is it, Cecil?”

“I’m not feeling so wel—”

“Do you need any water? I could make you some more tea, we’ve been talking awhile! I should probably let you rest, you probably can’t handle much conversation this early in the morning, I’m sorry I kept you up, I know you need your sleep and how much you enjoy conversation.”

Cecil deflated into the headboard, shaking her head, “None of that, I don’t want any of that—”

“What do you need then? More tea?”

Cecil managed an amused smile, while shaking her head, “I’m just wondering why you’re sitting way down there.”

She looked down at herself like she was surprised, was she sitting way down where? Too far away from something? Too close to something? She had sat herself by Cecil’s legs when she’d set down the tray, “Am I?” She asked.

Cecil nodded, “Yeah…can you…come up here?” She patted the bed beside her, the side that was always empty, “I’m cold and the fire doesn’t help. I…want…you…to sit up here with me.” Her voice almost shook as she said it, not able to look into Honey’s eyes and see all the disgust she knew was there. Cecil wanted to touch Honey more than anyone in the world, but she knew she wouldn’t understand.

“I was sitting down here in case anyone came to the door,” Honey said plainly, like Cecil wouldn’t pick up on that lie, “If I sat over there I would jostle you running to the door.”

“Honestly, there isn’t a need to run to the door, dad is already in town, if there is an emergency he’s not far from where he needs to be, come up here.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure, I need some lateral support.”

“I can come up there,” Honey said, getting up and moving around to the far side of the bed before crawling over to sit next to Cecil.

It was tame, but Cecil drooped down and rested her head on her, it was all she could do.

For agonizing minutes, the world around them was quiet. Cecil was too nervous to enjoy anything and it didn’t feel quite right, either. Honey’s displeasure radiated off her, she wasn’t quite a touchy girl herself, but was always eager to please. She was human, so she enjoyed touch well enough, but only in the intimacies of her family and lovers. That which Cecil clearly was not. They hugged sometimes and held hands sometimes, mostly for Cecil’s sake.

The silence and minutes wore on and Cecil began to wish for Honey’s monotonous chatter to come back. Anything to fill the cavernous spaces inside of Cecil.

And she wanted to make it worse, lean up and do something Honey wouldn’t do with her beau, let alone her. She wanted to figure out something with her, figure out things she barely understood, but wanted. She wanted to figure out if other people wanted it, too. Figure out if Honey wanted it.

A swish of shame and anger washed over her as she recalled Death’s taunting voice, You never think about sex. The intense shame stiffened Cecil’s body and she pulled her head off of Honey. If he knew, then everyone else had to know, too. She must be embarrassing herself desperately throwing herself at people’s shoulders wanting some kind of love. She hated herself for the mere thought of it. Couldn’t she just deal with it like Honey did? Honey could go her entire life never being touched. Cecil ought to be like that, too. There’s nothing special about someone touching you.

To cover up her shame, Cecil asked, “You said something about Lord Silver earlier, what were you going to say?”

“Just that I was embarrassed to kick people out in front of him. I love your dad, but he’s so petty. Lord Silver is the most accepting and morally upright man in the valley. He’d never throw someone out of his house like Marcello would.” Honey shook her head and shrugged.

“So Lord Silver was really here, huh? And dad didn’t have an annuerism?”

Honey laughed, then got that look on her face whenever they talked about boys mutually, “He was asking about you, all valiant and brave—thought to go out into the woods during the snow, wanted to take dogs after you, he knew you were alive all along.”

Cecil messed with her fingers in her lap, “We’re talking of Lord Silver S-Senior, right?”

“Senior??” Honey looked down at Cecil who was sliding down her arm, “No, uhm, he was there, too, but he was actually the one who insisted the witch come and séance your room. It was his son, you silly thing.” Honey flicked some of Cecil’s hair, “Why would Lord Silver Senior do something like that?”

“Course it was the boy, I’m just exhausted, can’t keep any names straight,” Cecil gave her best amused smile, folding away onto her back to please Honey. She had had moved her arm further from Cecil, doing her best to limit the contact. Cecil went ahead and cut it off completely for Honey’s sake, “He came to see me, though? O-or, rather, he came to pay his regards?”

“Yes! It was really sweet, I think he’d visit more if your dads could squabble it out. Marcello barely wanted Lord Silver near your room, gods, it’s been almost twenty years, you’d think they’d grow up, right?”

Cecil tapped her fingers on her stomach, she wanted Honey to go on. The Thing that happened Almost Twenty Years ago was super hush-hush by everyone. Honey, talky-gossipy Honey knew all about it and Dad knew all about Honey knowing all about it, therefore she’d been hush-hushed up. Cecil recognized that her dad didn’t want to talk about the feud between aristocrats, but twenty years was a suspicious number to Cecil. Almost Twenty Years ago was three years too much for Seventeen-Year-Old Honey and Lord Silver Junior, but barely a few months too much for Nineteen-Year-Old Cecil.  
But with her dad gone, Honey did go on, “Such petty men. All men are sort of petty, you know? Won’t let anything go,” she giggled, “Not to say anything bad about your father, of course, but he’s so silly sometimes. I wish they would make up and make amends, it’s painful, honestly. Such a silly thing for men to fight over, too. Usually that’s a woman’s thing, you know, Solomon and what not.”  
Cecil’s fingers tapped faster. She knew if she asked the critical question Honey would stop, she would know better. But if let alone? Would she babble too much and let it loose? Cecil didn’t even want to try and respond, lest Honey would realize she should stay quiet.

“Any-hooty-hoo!” Honey declared, stopping herself, “Enough of that talk of old boring things, you’re laying down,” she studied Cecil laid flat again, cursing Honey’s own self awareness and her unawareness of Cecil’s self, “Think I should let you sleep?”

“Yeah, maybe.”

“Okay, sweet thing,” she mumbled, petting Cecil’s hair lightly, “I’ll let you sleep and go cook.”

“I’ll be here,” Cecil responded.


	6. Chapter 6

Day six her dad was back with the news the townspeople were happy she was recovering.

He had bought her a soft knit hand toy, made to be kept in apron pockets. Cecil recognized it as a charm made by the witch. He and the witch had no qualm with each other. He used medicine and so did she, granted, she used sometimes less holy means than he and she sometimes asked a heftier price, something a little harder to give up than money. Cecil slid it into Honey’s apron while she fluffed Cecil’s pillow.

“How was Emily?” Cecil asked her dad as he sat in his rocker, reading, that afternoon and she knitted lace.

“She was fine. I told Thomas they might need to sleep in separate beds just in case, she might be overheating with her husband clinging onto her so hard.” He grinned, pushing his glasses up on his face to rub at his eyes, “I can’t do too much, but it didn’t seem like she was coming down with something.”

“Think she’ll be okay?”

“I believe so.”

Cecil wondered if she was going to be the one. The Winter One. She wondered if he was thinking about it now. She decided not to bring it up. He hated the superstition anyway. “That’s good. Honey told me all about Thomas being a worrywart.”

“I bet she did, she talk your ear off?”

“My ears fell off years ago, I have nothing for her to take.” Cecil leaned casually on a pillow, watching her dad smile and how small he looked in that rocking chair compared to Death, and how her dad could never push himself with his legs again like Death had.

It wasn’t her fault his legs had decided to die, but she wondered if life would have been a lot easier for him if she had, too. His legs had started to waver around twelve, by fourteen he used a cane, and by the time Cecil was falling apart herself at seventeen, he was stuck on his crutches. His legs had feeling and he could stand on them, swing them around, but he could never move them again. How much easier would life have been if he didn’t have to go up stairs or carry a bag of crap back and forth. A daughter is a heavy burden to carry when your legs can’t even carry your own heart.  
“It doesn’t matter anyway.” Cecil picked up her knitting again. “I like listening to her talk. I’d never get bored of her.”

“That’s good.” He smiled reassuringly at her. “It’s nice to see you feeling better. Feeling good enough to talk and well enough to sit up. I’m amazed at your recovery…” He tapped his fingers on his book, sizing her up, “Maybe you’re on the up and up?”

Cecil scrunched her eyebrows, “Up and up? You think so?”

“I know you have your good days and your bad, but you’re recovering so quickly—you haven’t been this good in a long time. I only have you on your basic meds right now and look at how well you’re doing…”

“I guess I am doing well…” She rubbed her leg subconsciously. _Cheater_. “I don’t know if I’d say I’m on the up and up.”

He got that smile. That smile. The smile he got when everything turned out okay. He pulled too hard and it worked out. The ends justified the means. He-knocked-over-his-friends-at-preschool-and-got-to-play with-the-toy-by-himself smile. There-couldn’t-possible-be-consequences-for-what-I’ve-done smile. “I think this is a good sign. You’re finally getting better.”

She glanced at him, afraid to meet that expectant look. She knew exactly what it looked like. He got excited every time she took a breath on her own. “I don’t feel that much better, to be honest.”

“It’s only been a few days,” he brushed her words off, “This is the beginning of something good, I can see it.”

Cecil let the conversation die. She just nodded dumbly looking at the half finished lace in her lap. Her knitting no longer made sense. Loop what? Double-stitch how? What number was she on? She kept picking it up and putting it down the design had gone off the deep end. She ought to rip it apart and start something else new.

“If everything keeps going well,” he kept talking, “We should do something good for Christmas. A special dinner or a trip…or…something I’ll have to figure out.” He picked up his book, his fingers dancing against the cover with excitement.

Cecil watched his fingers. She wondered if they ever started to hurt gripping to tight to themselves. She knew hers did. “Uhm, well, in that case…I’m feeling a little faint. I might take a nap before dinner.”

“Hum?” He looked up from his book, “Okay, I’ll leave you alone for a little. Maybe you’ll be able to sit at the table tonight.” He chattered eagerly to himself gathering his crutches and heaving to his feet.  
“Yeah,” she watched him go, “Maybe I will, who knows.”

 

She didn’t. Spoiler.

Not because she couldn’t. She just didn’t want to. She whined at Honey, a big pouty lip begging her to make up some excuse. Begging her to tell him she just looked too peaceful to wake up. Honey had smiled secretively, shut her door, and never come back.

Cecil waited so long and hard for her dad to come drag her to bed that she fell asleep again.

When she woke for the last time, it was due to the grandfather clock, started singing softly from some ancient part of the house. She believed it was in the den. He was one of the last remnants of Sam’s dad that hadn't been buried alongside him. Honey must have forgot to loose his chime for the night.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

She stared at the dark ceiling.

It was day seven.

It had been a week.

He was expecting her to get up and walk out to the clearing this morning. He expected her to be too scared to do it. He might be right.

Despite her brain being frayed at the edges, she had the energy to get up and walk. She got up all on her own. Took her own body with her own feet to the bathroom and washed her face. She had all this energy to fade around her home. Bathroom. Hall. Another hall. Dining room. Den. Ballroom. Hallway. Kitchen. Hall.

She stopped at the base of the stairs.

When she was seventeen she’d told her dad over her dead body would she sleep on the ground floor, even the day she had to sit every two steps before bedtime she climbed all the way up and slept there. That was her room. That was her bed. She wanted to sleep there. Suppose the day, and her dead body, had come.

It was worse that morning than it was going out into the storm.

The storm had been spur.

Cecil couldn’t sleeping, her body was angry, it refused to go to bed angry, too. And the clouds, had been heavy and angry all day, too. All the pieces were there even before the big fat angry flakes started to file one after another to the ground. Cecil had just known it’d be an awful night to be caught out in the snow. And then she was just walking to her window, opening it, climbing out, down the trellis, and walking into the woods walking to her unplanned death.

The deadline dragged heavily on her. She’d always had a deadline, it was a familiar feeling to wait and wait for a mystical encroaching deadline, not sure when the time would get itself together and happen. Less familiar to get to there.

The morning of her last day, standing at the foot of the stairs she wanted to go up to her room one more time. Despite what her dad had said, she knew she didn’t have the energy. Her legs were puddles and her mind was half gone. She hadn’t been to her room in eight days. She’d never see it again and it was all she wanted suddenly. Tell all her dolls goodbye, hug her bunny one last time, wrap up in her blanket and remember the smell of her own body.

It was just a room. They were just dolls. The same feelingless things she clings to, to keep her mind from going lonely insane like the feelingless people clinging to her. Those dolls and that room wouldn’t miss her and she didn’t need to go giving them a reason to.

She eventually turned from the twisting stairs and kept walking down the hall.

There was one room left on her list of rooms on this floor to come say goodbye to. A room with large French doors and a propensity for death. The parlor. Coincidentally, the same parlor where her father slept, wrapped in a blanket and resting on a couch next to a half dead fire in the fireplace. How could she have accidentally forgotten to wander that direction? Silly her.

Cecil came quietly into the room, leaving the doors open behind her.

She attended to the fire first, throwing only the lightest sticks onto it and trying to stir it back to life. It had a hard case of the early morning blues. She gave up and turned her attention to moving to sit on a chair near him.

He looked so tired. He was asleep, but he wasn’t getting any rest. He was running numbers in his head trying to make two different ends meet.

She didn’t feel like she was really there. She wasn’t really in that room with him and she wasn’t really in this body. She was floating half out of her body and everyone just needed to let her go. She was already a ghost, haunting this house and everyone around her. Every time everything got bad enough to where she thought every breath was its last, she’d tell her dad, working too hard to keep her there, “Just let me go” and every time he’d hold on too tight and she’d always come back. They were tearing each other apart holding onto each other.

The years of stress were showing on her father’s face, even asleep he looked tortured. His eyes and hair had been bleached of color years ago. All the life was gone from his old skin. He wasn’t even old. Maybe late forties. The damage she was doing to him was written in every crack of his face. Every withered white hair. She ought to let him live.

Cecil was tempted to try and crawl into his arms, force him to hold her. But she didn’t. She just kept sitting there, the night moving around them and the fire threatening to die again and again. She managed to lift a small log and push it into the fire. That should keep it alive for a few hours until her dad woke.

She sat back on the chair, pulled a little closer to him now, and gently nudged his hand out from under his blanket, taking a couple fingers cautiously in hers. He held her hands sometimes when she was little and he held her hands if she cried now, but . She’d had nightmares upon nightmares when she was little, but he refused to let her sleep in bed with him. Gruffly telling her, no matter her age, that she was too old to rely on him for bravery, that the dreams weren’t real. He wasn’t going to indulge in her immature wants. She would have to learn to deal with it.

No hugs. No hands. No kisses goodnight. No hair touches. No matter how bad it got. No nothing.

Upon remembering that, she decided that if she did crawl in with him, he wouldn’t let her stay. He wouldn’t understand that she needed to be held together lest her entire body shudder and break. That she needed a dad more than she needed a doctor.

She felt disconnected from him, from everyone. Holding his hand at arm’s reach between barely two fingers. She just wanted to stop living half a life. She wanted to pick a side, life or death, no more one foot in the door and the other three feet in the grave.

She didn’t even know what Death wanted, but she was going to go out there anyway. Prove to him something improvable. How could she prove to him they were hurting their fingers gripping onto something that just wanted to let go. Couldn’t he just see? Wasn’t it written on her face? Wasn’t it written on every face misfortunate enough to know her? Didn’t he know, didn’t everyone know how much better it’d feel when you stopped holding onto something so tight? It may hurt at first, and your fingers might yearn to clench up again, but in a minute your arm will relax and that looseness in your fingers will return. You’d forgotten about how relaxed muscle sit. How your head stops pulsing with blood. How your skin is supposed to be un-clawed by nails. Your shoulders relax and droop comfortably.

People are supposed to let go.

Couldn’t he see how holding so tightly was hurting them all?

Sam never came home anymore. Nathaniel chose prairies over them. They're dad died. Nathaniel's mom died. Sam and Cecil's mom died. Dad was falling apart at the seams. Honey was counting the days until she was free. The town was hiding from her. No one wanted to see someone suffer. Suffering was impossibly sad. So sad it turned into bad.

People love being sad. People can’t wait to celebrate their sorrow. They want to cry. They want an excuse to scream and fall to their knees. People want to be sad. They want a tangible hurt to express the ancient sorrow pent up in their souls. They want their hearts to break and everyone to know it has. People want the simplicity sadness brings. The ow. The my-heart-can-hardly-take-it. The relief that that sadness gives. Sadness was so simple.

No one wanted to feel _bad_. Two distinct feelings.

A dead dog is sad.

A blind, fat, half-crippled dog begging for food and seizing to sleep was just bad. It was better to be sad he was gone not feel bad he was suffering.

People don’t want to drag that sadness into badness. Sad was such an easy feeling. Someone died! Oh I am sad. Bad was incomprehensible. She’s dying and has been for her entire life. Ah. Bad. That is bad. I recognize that as bad. I don’t know what to feel. I cannot help her and that is bad. I will continue to feel bad until something is done to stop her suffering. The longer this sadness drags out the more badness it becomes. I want this badness to turn into sadness and this sadness to mean I can feel something easy and tangible. I want to cry and be done with my pain. I don’t want to feel bad.  
Cecil delicately uncurled one of his fingers, wrapping hers around it.

She felt bad. Incomprehensibly bad. Her body hurt. Her soul hurt. She, too, wanted to feel sad. She yearned for simple feelings. For a simple body. She yearned to let go. To dig her nails from her palm, to feel a freeness of her fingers. And the simplicity that crying brought.

“Time to let go,” Cecil said aloud hollowly, softly caressing her father’s fingers.

His fingers curled against hers like a baby’s. She held her hand flat, only tracing his fingers with her thumb. He had small hands. They wanted to curl into each other and never let go.

“Everything will feel better when we all let go.” She unclenched her fist.


End file.
